A poster for Camp Crystal Lake at Rocky Woods by Mister Reusch

 

Recently, I had a wonderful horror film experience. I got to watch a couple horror films in the woods with a whole bunch of other reprobates and it was a gas.

Friday night, close to a hundred people gathered at Rocky Woods in Medfield, Massachusetts (my home town) to watch a double-feature of Jason Voorhees’ best efforts. The Coolidge Corner Theatre’s Coolidge After Midnite, in conjunction with the Trustees of Reservations presented a walk-in. Technically, it wasn’t a drive-in since we parked our cars a few hundred yards away and walked to Camp Crystal Lake, unfolded our lawn chairs, and planted our butts in front of a large, outdoor screen to watch art house favorites, Friday the 13^th Part V: A New Beginning and Friday the 13^th Part VIII: Jason Takes Manhattan. The weather was pleasant and spring-like; the trustees cooked hamburgers and hot dogs and served craft beer; and Jason lumbered through the crowd wielding a machete. Ah…summer.

“Sure. Take my popcorn.”

The Coolidge has been showing horror films at Rocky Woods on various Fridays the 13^th for a couple years now and I’ve only missed one. That night, it rained so hard, the animals would have refused to walk outside to get on the ark. When you live in the suburbs and crave cult, indie, horror, or just plain weird films, you either buy them (which I do—too often), or trek into the city, struggle to park, and creep back out toward home far too late on a school night. Whenever someone ventures out my way, I’m in.

I’ve enjoyed every showing. I go alone, but I usually go to movies alone. Oddly, my friends and even my daughter, who’s game sometimes, aren’t keen to hike down a dark path, sit in the woods, and commune with a guy dressed as a mute, psychopathic, but resilient murderer. The people I work with are convinced I have a screw loose. Maybe I do, but I have a good time.

On this Friday the 13^th, we watched Friday the 13^th Part V: A New Beginning and Friday the 13^th Part VIII: Jason Takes Manhattan. It wouldn’t matter which of the Jasons played, I have a soft spot for each one of them.

Friday the 13^th Part V: A New Beginning

Tommy (John Shepherd) has seen some shit. He’s done some shit, too. As a child, when he was Corey Feldman, he watched Jason Voorhees kill some of his family and friends, so he killed Jason back. Since then, he’s been a bit…off. To help him recover from his post-Jason trauma, the state sends Tommy to a facility for troubled youth out in the sticks. With the help of Matt (Richard Young) and Pam (Melanie Kinnaman), who run the camp, Tommy will be back to his old self in no time, right? Not so much. Unfortunately, someone (Is it Jason?) starts killing the kids at the halfway house. Can Tommy make it out alive? Reggie (Shavar Ross) does a nice job and the main characters seem less stupid, and more, unlucky. I cared when some of them came to a sticky end.

Pam and Reggie made a good team.

Friday the 13^th Part VIII: Jason Takes Manhattan

A class cruise to New York City goes pear-shaped when Jason (Kane Hodder) stows away and begins culling the graduating class. Rennie Wickham (Jensen Daggett), our star, has a problem. She’s afraid of the water. Naturally, she climbs aboard a boatload of jerks, including her class principal/uncle, Charles (Peter Mark Richman), who’s off-the-rails obnoxious. Will the boat dock in NYC? Will Rennie figure out why she hates the water? Will Uncle Charles get tossed out a window and drowned in raw sewage? Well, yes.

Ya think?

There are a few inventive deaths in this film and some characters no one will miss. I love when Jason stands up to the gang of toughs. The dog, Toby, played by Ace, was my favorite character.

Ace, as Toby

At the screening, Mark Anastasio, program manager of the Coolidge, announced their upcoming October feature, It. I’m excited! As long as the Coolidge keeps putting on these woodsy film festivals, I’ll be there.

Hi, Mom!

Last night, Friday the 13th, my teenager and I watched Kevin Bacon get an arrow through the throat under the stars. As a part of the Coolidge Corner Theatre’s After Midnite film series, the theatre, in conjunction with the Trustees of Reservations, presented a double-feature in the open air. At Rocky Woods Reservation in Medfield, Massachusetts, cinephiles brought lawn chairs and blankets and gathered in forty-degree weather to watch Friday the 13th and Jason Lives: Friday the 13th Part VI, in the woods. There were bonfires and hot cocoa and popcorn and Jason. Yes, I said Jason, and not just on the screen. As part of Rocky Woods’ transformation from a lovely park full of hiking trails and a pond (where I skated as a child) to Camp Crystal Lake, the Coolidge arranged for the big man himself to show up for photo ops and to menace the audience.

What a trip! A Boston Burger Company food truck made burgers and fries for the audience of Jason devotees who devoured them and the films. We laughed at the ever-fashionable cutoffs and suspenders and jumped at the axes to the face and other creative bits of violence and had a great time. I’m impressed with how smoothly everything ran and with how good the film looked at an outdoor venue on a windy night with real leaves falling in front of the screen. Whoever came up with this idea needs a raise. What an entertaining night!

My teen getting a trim from the master.

Since I wrote this in November of 2015, the Coolidge has held three (?) other screenings of different Friday the 13th films at Rocky Woods and I’ve been to nearly all of them. One may have been cancelled because of a rainstorm that would have made Noah consider postponing. They’ve all been fun, well-organized, and full of enthusiastic and congenial fans hanging together in the woods where they huddle under blankets to watch a psychopath kill some campers. It’s a sweet night.